Anne Boleyn's necklace

[lizbee]

In the comments to my second picspam yesterday, a couple of people expressed amusement at Anne's "B" necklace.




It is, in fact, a replica of a real necklace owned and worn by Anne:



The "B" necklace has become synonymous with Anne herself, as it features in most of the historical portraits of her.  The one above (Holdbein, I think) is the earliest, but even it is apparently a copy of a lost original.  According to Alison Weir's Henry VIII, King and Court, such jewellery was extremely popular.  Anne also owned an "AB" necklace, and one with an overlapping "H" and "A":





Some of this jewellery was eventually passed on to Elizabeth I, and there are records of her wearing it, but after that, who knows?  The "B" necklace is allegedly in the hands of a wealthy Canadian socialite, but here, you should have a grain of salt with that.

Comments

[fyrdrakken]

And this post sent me to the Museum Replicas The Tudors selection to check if any of their pretty pretty bits of jewelry based on the series included the B necklace. Sadly, no. Two pairs of earrings, an Anne gown, a Katherine gown, and all the rest is for cosplaying as Henry. (And I could have sworn I recalled some actual necklaces in the print catalog, too.)